The Others

I actually took some time to watch a couple of movies having to do with the supernatural. The first was just for a bit of nostalgia. There’s not a lot left to be said about The Night of the Living Dead after all this time. It was a fun movie to take to our cabin and watch one evening.

The other movie was more contemporary and much more interesting. The Others was a fascinating movie, with a good story and very good acting. Nicole Kidman as the mother of two children living in a fog-haunted house, apparently isolated somewhat from the nearest village. Both the children are very sensitive to light and the drapes in the house must be kept closed. I was never quite sure why the doors had to be closed and locked when one was finished with the room. It made Kidman’s character seem very paranoid. The housekeeper, servant girl and gardener who are hired had apparently worked there before and seem to know the house intimately. But there are things that go bump in the night ... and the daytime as well. Noises upstairs. One of the eerie scenes in the movie is when the piano is played. The mother rushes to the room, unlocks the door and throws it open and finds no one there. The daughter seems to be more sensitive to the ghosts than the mother, who does not want to believe her child. At one point the father, missing and presumed dead in a war that has ended a couple of years before, shows up. Then before long he is gone again. There is a strong overlay of religious belief on the part of the mother. As punishment the daughter is made to read from the Bible. I won’t give away the ending in case some of you haven’t seen it. But the stacking of ghosts upon ghosts upon ghosts is in the end very effective. I probably enjoyed this film much more than most films of the supernatural that I have viewed in the last several years. I must admit that I don't watch many movies of this kind.